EXCLUSIVE: Deadline can reveal the first clip of Scarlett Johansson‘s directorial debut Eleanor the Great, which will premiere in the Un Certain Regard lineup at the Cannes Film Festival, which begins next week.
The culmination of Johansson’s long-held dream to direct a feature, Eleanor the Great stars nonagenarian June Squibb as Eleanor, a woman grieving the loss of Bessie, her best friend and roommate. When she moves to Manhattan to live with her daughter and grandson, Eleanor finds herself going on something of an odyssey in search of connection — with sometimes shocking results. When she inadvertently joins a Holocaust survivors’ group, Eleanor is reminded of her late friend Bessie’s harrowing experience growing up in Nazi-occupied Poland. But, when Nina, a journalism student, takes a vested interest in Eleanor, the truth suddenly becomes a slippery subject.
The above first-look clip shows Squibb as Eleanor in feisty form. As she readies to pack up and leave Florida for New York, she shuts down her passive aggressive neighbor’s comments with a comeback about the woman’s husband. “Say goodbye to Melvin for me,” Eleanor says, with a twinkle in her eye. “We had such a wonderful time the other night. He’s very strong.”
Johansson has been behind the camera before, directing a 12-minute short called These Vagabond Shoes for the 2008 portmanteau film New York, I Love You. But this is the first feature she’s ever directed.
The film also stars Erin Kellyman as Nina, Chiwetel Ejiofor as Nina’s father, Breaking Bad‘s Jessica Hecht as Eleanor’s daughter and Holocaust survivor Rita Zohar as Bessie. Kellyman, who will next appear in Danny Boyle’s 28 Years Later, was most recently seen alongside Saoirse Ronan in Blitz.
Eleanor the Great is from a screenplay by first-time feature writer Tory Kamen, and sees Sony Pictures Classics and TriStar Pictures partnering for the first time. The film is produced by Johansson’s These Pictures with Jonathan Lia and Keenan Flynn, Pinky Promise’s Jessamine Burgum and Kara Durrett, and Maven Screen Media’s Trudie Styler and Celine Rattray.
Check out the clip above.
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